He'll Walk
by Suki-Itami
Summary: It was prom night and Butters owed Kenny for making him go to prom. Unfortunately, Kenny lets the wrong thing slip and what happens afterward will determine if their relationship will work.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** Based off of _"I'll Walk"_ by Bucky Covington

…

Loud music could be heard pumping out of the open glass doors leading to the gymnasium of South Park high school. Inside, a strobe light kept the beat of the techno music as the upperclassmen students danced to it. It was prom night, so everyone inside was either wearing a tux or elegant dress.

One group standing near the doors wore what looked like fairly expensive tuxes. Two wore black tuxes with red flowers in the left breast pockets, one wore a white tux with a light purple flower, and the other wore a red tux with a light purple flower.

Stan Marsh - one of the two in black - had his black hair gelled down so that it wouldn't go in every direction. Kyle Broflosky - the other in black - had his wavy red hair hanging around his face lightly. Butters - the one in white - had front of his blonde hair gelled back out of his face. Kenny McCormick - the one in red - still had his blonde hair sticking out in tufts going every which way.

"You sure that you wanna leave?" Stan asked.

Butters nodded, bumping his fists together. "Y-Yeah. I promised Kenny that…I'd pay him back for making him come to p-prom."

Kenny got a devious smile on his face and wrapped his arms around Butters' shoulders. "We'll see you guys on Monday."

Kyle nodded. "Okay then." He grabbed Stan's hand as the two went back onto the dance floor.

Kenny entwined his fingers in Butters' and led the smaller boy out to the parking lot. He had borrowed his father's truck for the night so that they wouldn't have to rely on someone else to get them to and from prom. He unlocked the passenger's side and opened the door for Butters to get in before walking around to the driver's side.

Kenny pulled out of the parking lot quickly, seeing as no one else was out of prom yet - there was still a half hour left - and sped off towards his house. About halfway back though, Butters cell phone rang and his parents told him to go home right then.

"Sorry Kenny," he apologized as he slid his phone back into his pant pocket.

Kenny sighed heavily as he slowly stopped at the one stoplight in South Park. He wracked his brain, trying to think of a way to still get his payback for being forced to go to prom while getting Butters home in a reasonable amount of time. He looked over to his left and noticed the empty parking lot of J-Mart, and suddenly got an idea.

When the light turned green, Kenny turned into the parking lot and came to a screeching halt. Butters bumped his fists together nervously and asked, "W-What are you doing? …I need to get home."

Kenny turned the truck off and moved to where he was sitting in Butters' lap in the passenger's seat. He took off Butters' jacket, showing the plain black t-shirt he was wearing beneath as Kenny gently kissed his boyfriend.

Butters put his hands on Kenny's chest and pushed the taller boy away weakly. "K-Kenny, I really need to…to get home."

"Your parents won't care if you're a little late, I'm sure," Kenny purred as he kissed Butters' neck. "It is prom night after all."

"But Kenny…"

"Besides, you're almost eighteen."

"But they'll ground me if I'm…if I'm late." Butters pushed him away again.

Kenny sighed angrily and plopped back down in the driver's seat. "Dammit Butters, sometimes you need to bend the rules a little! You can't always do as your parents say! Are you a pussy or something?"

Butters looked down at his hands, resting in his lap, sadly. He reached for the door handle and stepped out of the truck. Kenny sighed again, realizing he said the wrong thing and reached out for Butters' hand that was grabbing the white jacket. Butters froze but didn't look up at his boyfriend.

"Butters, I'm sorry. I didn't mean what I said. I'll drive you home, baby," Kenny said softly.

Butters shook his head. "No, I'll just walk." He let go of the jacket and slipped his hand out of Kenny's.

"It's late. You could get hurt."

"I already did." He slammed the passenger's door shut and began walking towards his house.

Kenny looked out the windshield sadly before driving off towards his house, cursing himself the whole way.


	2. Chapter 2

Kenny pulled into the driveway and skulked into his house with his head hung. A couple cans of beer from his father's stash would make him feel a little less shitty about what he said to Butters. He tore off his jacket and threw it over the back of the couch, and then continued skulking into the kitchen for a beer.

As he entered the kitchen though, his mother hung up the phone and faced him with a worried look etched into her face. He stopped and looked over at her with concern. "What's wrong?"

"You need to get down to Hells Pass hospital," she said quickly.

"Why?" He suddenly got a sinking feeling deep in his stomach.

"That was Butters' parents. He was hit by a car and had to be taken to the ER."

Kenny's eyes welled up with tears as he turned back around and ran back to the truck, barely pausing to grab the keys. He didn't care that it was below freezing and he was wearing a thin short-sleeved button up shirt, he just needed to hurry and get to the hospital.

As he sped down the street towards the hospital his brain was screaming that it was all his fault. If he hadn't said what he did to Butters, then he wouldn't have gotten run down by that car, and then wouldn't be dying in the hospital. Okay, so maybe no one told him Butters was **dying**, but Kenny's mind turned to the worst possible scenario since he wasn't told what was wrong with his lover.

He arrived at Hells Pass hospital, five miles outside of the other side of town, about ten minutes later. Without slowing down, Kenny swerved into a parking space near the doors and slammed on the brakes before jumping out of the truck and dashing inside.

He stopped for only a moment to ask the person at the front counter where Butters' room was before taking off again to a room at the end of a hallway. Once he reached the doorway, he stopped to catch his breath and looked inside. He could see the back of Butters' father, Chris's head, and suddenly felt like he was going to fall apart when he faced them.

_This is my fault… This is all my fault._ Kenny clawed at his shirt nervously as he slowly walked into the room.

The doctor looked over at him as he walked in the room, drawing Chris and Linda's attention to him. Kenny took another breath as he looked over at Butters, who was cut up and bruised, but still conscious. "So, um, how is he?" He glanced at the doctor when he felt tears stinging the corners of his eyes whenever he looked at Butters.

Chris took his wife's hand and led her out of the room so that they didn't have to hear it again. Kenny looked at them worriedly as they left; it was never a good sign when the parents left their own child's hospital room.

Once they left, Kenny looked back at the doctor as he looked at Butters and said, "He'll be right back, son, okay…?"

Butters nodded. "Okay."

The doctor grabbed Kenny's shoulder gently and led him outside of the door. "The accident caused enough nerve damage in his legs that he can't even feel them."

"Did it sever his spine?" He didn't know a lot about medicine, but he did know enough just from watching TV to know just what could've happened.

The doctor shook his head. "No, no, don't worry, it's nothing like that. It's just that there was severe nerve damage in his legs, but it is possible that he could never walk again. If he does the physical therapy, then there is hope for him though."

Kenny looked back into the room, from where he was standing he could see Butters' covered legs. "…I see… Was he hurt beyond that?"

"Nothing severe. He has a few bruises and lacerations, mostly on his chest." The doctor looked over from the chart in his hands and smiled. "You must be a close friend of his to be so concerned."

Kenny nodded at the doctor. "Yeah…Yeah, I am."

"It's always good for a friend to visit, especially considering it's prom night. Well, I'll check back in in about half an hour." He turned and walked off.

Kenny took a breath and walked back into the room with as best a smile as he could manage. "H-Hey there Butters."

Butters looked at him and smiled. "Hey there Kenny."

Kenny sat down in a chair next to the bed and scooted close enough to where his legs were bumping against the bed, and grabbed Butters' hand. "I'm sorry." He bent his head down and bit his bottom lip.

Butters grabbed onto Kenny's hand, still smiling. "It's not your fault."

Kenny's eyes widened with shock; he looked up at his boyfriend. "You don't blame me for this?"

Butters shook his head. "W-Why should I? You're not the one who…who ran me over."

"But I'm the reason-"

"No." He shook his head again. "This was just…well, it was just a random accident."

Kenny felt tears running down his face as he chuckled humorlessly. "You're too good for me."

"What's wrong Ken?"

He shook his head and leaned over Butters, kissing him chastely. "I'm just happy you're alive."

Butters smiled. "I'm happy that you're happy…but I won't be able to do a lot since I can't feel my legs." He took his hand and began bumping his fists together.

Kenny shook his head. "It's okay, Butters." All of a sudden, he crawled behind Butters and wrapped his arms around the smaller boy's torso and settled him between his legs. He fit nicely there, as if he were made to sit there.

"W-What're you doing?"

"Can I please hold you like this…for a while, please?" He rested his chin on Butters' shoulder gently in case it was bruised.

Butters smiled and leaned back into Kenny's chest, slowly closing his eyes as he gripped onto his boyfriend's arms.


	3. Chapter 3

Kenny dug his cell phone out of his pocket and checked to make sure he had enough minutes before hitting the speed dial for Stan's cell phone. Butters had fallen asleep a few minutes ago, and Kenny thought it would be a good idea to call Stan and Kyle to tell them what was happening. They were either at after-prom or going home by this time, so they wouldn't know anything yet.

The phone rang twice before it was answered. "Hello?" It was Kyle's voice and he was panting; Kenny could only imagine what they were doing.

"Kyle, it's Kenny," he said quickly so that the other boy wouldn't hang up. "Can you and Stan get to Hells Pass Hospital?"

"For what?" Kyle's voice turned to concern and in the background Stan asked what was going on.

"Something…happened with Butters."

"What happened?" Kyle clicked the speaker button so that Stan could hear what was going on.

Kenny took a breath and leaned back against the hallway wall. "He was run over."

"Run over?" Stan asked. "How? I thought you were driving him to your house."

"…I, uh… Look, that's unimportant. Can you guys just get here?"

"Um…yeah…" In the background, a car could be heard starting up.

"We'll be there soon," Kyle said before hanging up.

Kenny sighed and flipped his phone shut. He knew he had to go to the front of the building so that he could show them where Butters' room was, but worried that if Butters woke up alone, he'd think that he'd been abandoned. Surely not though; morphine can keep someone out for a good few hours at the least, so Kenny would be back before he woke up.

He popped his head back into the room for a moment to make sure Butters was still asleep before he walked to the front of the hospital. He stepped outside into the freezing cold, just realizing it as he pulled one of his menthol cigarettes out of his pocket and lit it up.

As he blew the smoke from his mouth, he leaned against the wall and ran his other hand through his hair. This was the first moment for the past few hours he'd been even a little relaxed, and even now the worry festered deep in his stomach. He realized then that he might never be able to get rid of the worry as long as Butters was unable to walk - which could be for a very long time.

Just after he flicked aside his second cigarette, Stan pulled his used '92 Chevy Cavalier into a nearby parking space and him and Kyle hopped out. They walked over to Kenny; Stan bummed a cigarette off of him.

"So, how did Butters get run over?" Kyle asked as he waved the smoke from the cigarette Stan was smoking out of his face.

Kenny sighed, he'd known someone was gonna ask about it, but he had hoped that it wouldn't be until later. "Well…um…I…I just fucked up. I said something to him that I shouldn't have and it hurt him real bad. He got out of the truck and decided to walk home instead."

"What did you say to him?"

He looked at the ground sadly. "I said… It just slipped out, I didn't really mean what I said!"

Stan blew the smoke out of his nose. "Kenny, calm down." He grabbed his friend's arm comfortingly.

"Yeah, dude." Kyle nodded. "If you really feel that bad about it, you don't have to tell us."

Kenny nodded and took a breath, resisting the urge to grab another cigarette. "…What I said is irrelevant anyway. The point is that Butters is hurt."

"How bad?" Stan asked as he took one last drag of the cigarette before he snuffed it out in the bowl of sand the hospital had in the smoking area.

"They don't think he'll be able to use his legs ever again," Kenny said solemnly.

Kyle and Stan exchanged a concerned look and each wrapped an arm around Kenny's shoulders as the three boys walked back into the hospital. They walked down the hall and into Butters' room, finding that he was still asleep.

"He has a lot of bruises," Stan said softly as he took his place on one side of the chair Kenny sat in.

Kyle nodded. "He doesn't look so bad though."

Kenny shook his head. "A lot of the bruises and cuts are on his chest." He grabbed onto Butters' hand gently. "And even then, he's bandaged up, so I couldn't really see it."

"You tried to look?" Stan lifted an eyebrow.

"I just wanted to see how badly he was hurt. I was concerned about him, that's all."

Kyle nodded. "Understandable."

Kenny leaned over and kissed the top of his boyfriend's hand. At the same time, he prayed that Butters would be okay and would walk again sometime soon.

At that moment, the doctor walked into the room. "Sorry it took me so long to get back here, but it's been a busy night."

Kenny shook his head. "It's okay."

The doctor looked at Stan and Kyle. "You two are friends of his?"

"Yeah," they both replied.

Kyle then added, "We've been told what happened to Butters."

"That speeds things up then." The doctor nodded and flipped through the chart. "Well, he should be fine until morning. I suggest that you boys go on home."

Kenny shook his head. "I want to just stay here."

"Well, son, I'm sorry but-" He was cut off as a loud, long singular beep came from the machine they had hooked up to Butters. "Damn, he's crashing!" He grabbed the three boys and threw them out of the room as he screamed for a nurse and a crash cart.

A quick moment later, the door slammed shut and Kenny sank against the wall, unable to comprehend what just happened. But suddenly he felt like his heart was going to explode, and gripped onto his chest. What was this? A heart attack?

"Kenny?" Kyle looked back at his friend as his boyfriend did just in time to see Kenny collapse forward.

Stan and Kyle caught their friend with a small yell from them both. "Shit," Stan cursed. "Our friend needs help!"

A nurse looked over and saw what was going on, and ran over to help.


	4. Chapter 4

_He was standing before a polished stone grave with tears running down his face. No one else seemed to notice or care, but he knew that they had noticed him and were just giving him his space as the sadness deep in his heart flowed out of his eyes._

_Why had this happened? They said that he was going to be okay and that nothing else was wrong with him, and then suddenly he had just…_

_This world is just so fucked up how it takes away the person that you love and cherish with all of your soul._

_He finally got the courage to look at the grave, though he already knew the name carved into the stone…_

_Leopold "Butters" Stotch_

…

Kenny snapped into a sitting position in the bed with sweat running down his forehead. "Butters?"

Kyle jumped and dropped the textbook he had been doing his homework from. "Jesus Christ!" He looked over at Kenny and pushed his small thin rimmed glasses up on his nose. "Kenny, you scared me half to death."

"Sorry." He shook his head, trying to clear his mind of the dream-no, nightmare, he reminded himself. "How's Butters doing?"

"He woke up a few hours ago," Kyle said as he picked up his textbook from the ground. "Stan's been with him."

"I see." Kenny looked around, having no idea where he was. "What happened? Where am I?"

"When Butters crashed, you had an anxiety attack. Only about five minutes after they had you asleep and stabilized, Butters turned out to be okay. One of the nurses just gave him too much morphine."

He sighed in relief. "Thank God."

"Stan told him that you went into the lounge area to sleep, so don't worry about him finding out about this," Kyle said reassuringly.

Kenny nodded. "Yeah… Thanks." He looked over at Kyle with a confused look in his eye. "Since when do you wear glasses?"

"Since I forgot an extra pair of contact-lenses at home last night." Kyle shrugged. "It doesn't matter anyway, I'm just glad I carry them with me." He shut the textbook.

"Were you carrying that with you?"

"No, I left it in Stan's car yesterday afternoon. I remembered it was in there and decided to try to finish some homework while you were still out."

"Why do you keep saying 'yesterday' and 'last night?' What time is it?"

"It's eight in the morning. You were out for just over six hours."

"I see…" Suddenly, Kenny swung his legs out of bed and stretched, popping his shoulders and neck as he did so. "I feel okay actually."

"Yeah, the doctor said you would," Kyle said as he stood up with the textbook shoved under his arm like a football. "He also said that you would be okay to go back to Butters' room as soon as you woke up."

Kenny smiled. "Great, then let's go!" He grabbed Kyle's wrist and led him back to Butters' room, which he found with surprising ease.

As they entered, they found Stan covering his mouth and turning the color of a cherry, and Butters laughing as hard as he possibly could. Kyle asked what was going on, but didn't really get a straight answer from either boy. Kenny walked over to the side of the bed Stan wasn't sitting near and sat down on the bed next to his boyfriend.

"So, what were you two talking about that embarrassed him?" Kenny purred into Butters' ear.

Now Butters blushed, but he did actually reply this time: "Well, you see, I saw Stan had some white stuff on the corner of his mouth…and when I pointed it out, he turned bright red and began trying to explain why it was there."

Kenny thought for a moment about that, putting together the fact that Kyle had been panting on the other end of the line when he had picked up the phone with what Butters had just told him…and began laughing too.

Kyle turned red and sighed heavily. "Just great… What was your 'great' explanation?"

Stan stayed the color of a cherry as he said, "W-Well, I eventually just told him."

Kyle sighed again and hid his eyes behind his hand embarrassingly. "Just wonderful…"

Kenny continued laughing, nearly falling off of the bed as he did. Butters held onto his arm in what would've been a futile attempt to prevent him from falling to the ground.

Kyle grabbed Stan's arm and pushed him into the hospital room's bathroom. "Wash your face."

Eventually, Kenny stopped laughing and wrapped his arms around Butters' shoulders lovingly. He nuzzled his boyfriend's neck, earning a giggle from him. Kyle smiled as Stan walked back out of the bathroom with a light blush still slightly on his face.

"Butters?" Linda stopped and stared with wide eyes at Butters and Kenny.

"Oh hamburgers," Butters mumbled and started bumping his fists together.

Kenny looked over at Butters' mom and said, "What? You know about us."

Kyle and Stan exchanged a knowing look before they said they were going to go tell Cartman what was going on and left.

"I told you, young man," she scolded, ignoring Kenny completely, "no visitors before noon!"

"Sorry ma'am," Butters said sadly.

"You will be sorry, you're gr-"

"Just shut up!" Kenny yelled, not even wanting to hear a syllable of that final word. "Butters is laying here unable to walk, and yet you still feel, for some reason, that you need to ground him? What's the hell's wrong with you?"

She was rendered speechless, her glare was gone and was replaced with shock. No one had ever questioned her over her grounding her son before. "…W-What?"

"I…I'm sorry mom. Kenny's just w-worried about me," Butters said. "And…well, gosh darn it, I think that h-he should be able to come whenever he wants."

Kenny smiled at his boyfriend. _You're too cute when you try to get your way._

Linda looked at the ground for a moment and said, "Well then, I suppose it's fine for him to be here. Really, I was just coming here to tell you, Butters, that your grandmother passed away last night."

"O-Oh, really?" He bumped his fists together.

"Yeah. Your father and I have to go to New Jersey for a week or two. You should be okay until we get back."

Kenny lifted an eyebrow. He'd have to stay with Butters the entire time, especially if he were released while his parents were still away.

Butters nodded. "Y-Yeah. If I'm let out of the hospital, I-I can just find someone to help me."

"I'll do it," Kenny offered quickly, knowing that there would be no "no" from either Butters or Linda.

She nodded. "Of course. Well, your father's in the car waiting, I'm gonna go now." She turned and left.

"Lovely woman," Kenny grumbled as he rolled his eyes.

"Oh, s-she's not so bad. S-She's just a little sad about grandma is all," Butters said.

Kenny chuckled and pulled his boyfriend into a gentle embrace. "You always look to the bright side… That's why I love you."

Butters smiled and wrapped the arm without the IV in it around Kenny. "I-I love you too, Ken."


	5. Chapter 5

That afternoon, the doctor from the night before walked in and told Butters about his options concerning physical therapy. The teenager was somewhat reluctant because he didn't want to go through all of it only to find out he still wouldn't be able to walk, but ended up agreeing for Kenny's sake.

"We can start the therapy later today, if that's what you would like to do," the doctor said as he wrote something down on his chart. "The sooner you start, the better."

Butters nodded. "Okay, I can do that."

"Great." The doctor smiled and wrote something else down. "I will send one of the therapists up shortly to help you out of bed and into a wheelchair."

"I can get Butters into a wheelchair," Kenny offered. "Just tell me where to go after he's in the wheelchair."

"You want to do that?" The doctor asked just to be sure.

"Yeah, I have no problem with it."

"Okay then. I'll bring a wheelchair up then." He turned and left the room for a wheelchair.

Butters bumped his fists and looked over at his boyfriend. "A-Are you sure you don't want to go hang out with Stan and Kyle?"

"Of course I'm sure." Kenny smiled at Butters. "I'll stay with you through all of this."

Butters smiled. "Well, thanks Ken."

"No need to thank me," Kenny grabbed Butters' hands, "I just want you to be okay."

"O-Okay."

"Knock knock," Kyle said with a smile in his voice as him and Stan walked into the room.

"Hey guys," Kenny smiled, "where's Cartman?"

Stan and Kyle exchanged a look and then looked at their friend. Stan scratched the back of his head. "Well, uh, I'll talk to you about it later, okay?"

"Uh, sure," Kenny said slowly. He was afraid of what it was about, though he realized that he would need to find out whether or not to kill Cartman.

"Here we go," the doctor said as he walked into the room with a wheelchair. "Just take a left outside of the door and keep going down the hall, a nurse will be outside of the door to the physical therapy room waiting for you."

"Alright then." Kenny picked up Butters bridal style as Kyle grabbed the IV and followed Kenny as he carried Butters to the wheelchair and sat him down gently. "Kyle," he looked at his friend, "could you continue pushing that as I push the wheelchair?"

Kyle nodded. "Sure."

Kenny pushed Butters in the wheelchair with Kyle and Stan following down the hall until a blonde nurse stopped them. She said that she needed to speak with Butters alone for a minute about legal matters and then pushed him and the IV into the room.

"So, what's up with Cartman?" Kenny asked as soon as the door closed.

"Well," Stan looked at Kyle for a moment and then continued, "when we told him that Butters is in the hospital, he looked more pissed off than anything."

"Pissed off?" Kenny raised an eyebrow in confusion. "Why?"

"We think that Cartman might've had something to do with this."

"What? I mean, I know he can be an asshole, but you don't really think he'd think about something like this. Butters could've been **killed**."

"He asked if Butters was dying or dead," Kyle said concernedly, "and when we said that he isn't, he looked pissed off. We got a good look at his car when we were leaving and part of the front bumper had blood on it and was slightly dented in. It looked like it happened recently too."

"Are you sure it was blood, not paint?" Kenny knew they were telling the truth, but for some reason, he still had faith in Cartman's ability to be humane.

"Dude, we checked, that's what took us so long," Stan said. "We're not sure it's Butters' blood, but considering Cartman's behavior…it could be."

"We gave it to the county police to run a DNA scan," Kyle said. "Barbrady said that the county was the one doing the investigation on the accident, that's how we knew where to go. And the police chief said he'd contact us when the scan came back, whether or not the blood belongs to Butters."

Kenny nodded. He did want the person who hit Butters to die a very slow and painful death, and considering the person just drove off, he knew they must not have cared if Butters lived or died. But surely Cartman didn't…

The door to the physical therapy room opened and the nurse said that Kenny could go into the room. Stan and Kyle said they'd be down in the cafeteria, and to get them when Butters went back to his room before they left.


End file.
